Here’s where money from Alaska’s opioid settlement is going

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Willy Dunne, vice president of Kachemak Bay Recovery Connection, stands in front of their mobile recovery unit. The organization will use funds from the state’s opioid settlement to open a center in downtown Homer and staff it. (Photo courtesy of Kachemak Bay Recovery Connection)

Alaska’s Division of Public Health announced 18 organizations in the state that will get grants as part of the National Opioid Settlement. The grants will fund programs to help communities address the state’s increasingly-deadly opioid epidemic.

Kachemak Bay Recovery Connection, an organization based in Homer that provides resources for people in recovery, is one of the grant recipients. Willy Dunne, the organization’s vice president, who is in long-term recovery himself, said the $142,742 grant will fund peer support specialists, people with lived experience trained in support.

“They can relate to people in early recovery in ways that other clinicians might not be able to relate,” Dunne said. “So, that lived experience has been shown to be a very valuable tool in helping people expand and strengthen the recovery from substance use disorders.”

Dunne said the grant will also allow the organization to open a physical space in downtown Homer and to expand the reach of their mobile unit to communities further from Homer like Seldovia and Port Graham.

Set Free Alaska, another organization receiving $285,714 from the settlement funds, is a Christian organization that serves Alaskans in recovery, regardless of religion. They have outpatient centers in Wasilla and Homer.

Jason Manalli, their development director, said the grant will help expand their telehealth capabilities to reach more people in the Mat-Su borough, Kenai, and Soldotna.

“Over the last couple of years, we’ve actually refined our practice and our service line to be able to provide quality service through telehealth, and it’s provided us a great opportunity to be able to reach people that we wouldn’t be able to reach in person,” Manalli said.

The funds came from settlements with Johnson & Johnson and three major pharmaceutical distributors, companies that contributed to the opioid epidemic nationally and in Alaska. According to the division of public health, the grants represent just under $3 million annually for three years, totaling about $8.5 million.

The money Alaska has from settlements is tiny compared to the real cost of the opioid epidemic in the state. In a recent report, the Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority estimated that the opioid crisis cost Alaska about $400 million in just one year. That estimate factors in loss of productivity due to addiction and loss of life for the hundreds of Alaskans who die every year from opioid overdose.

The organizations funded are the Alaska Behavioral Health Association, the Bethel Family Clinic, the Camai Community Health Center, the Aleutian Pribilof Islands Association, Southeast’s Kin Support Program – Haa Yatix’u Saiani, Petersburg Medical Center, Prince of Wales Health Network, Norton Sound Health Corporation, Maniilaq Association, Mat-Su Youth Housing, Set Free, Sunshine Community Health Center, Interior AIDS Association, Central Peninsula General Hospital, Kachemak Bay Recovery Connections, Akeela, Alaska’s Children’s Trust, and Volunteers of America Alaska.

RELATED: A Homer needle exchange offers safer supplies for rural Alaskans and a bridge to recovery

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Here’s where money from Alaska’s opioid settlement is going

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